Seven Birthdays
by Kilameida
Summary: This is a short oneshot about Karkat's birthdays up till now. Written for 612. Happy 612, everyone!


Seven Birthdays

Gods I have to write more consistently.

Anyways, have a little tribute to 2013's 612.

Written for my dear friends in Homestuck Indonesia.

* * *

A little grub opens its eyes. As of yet, its gender is not determined, except by destiny.

It surveys his immediate surroundings, and then closes its eyes right back again – it hurts to see so many and so little colors at the same time. It sees a lot of brown and black and white little pinpricks in the skies, a stark contrast from the grey and blue of a _thing _surrounding him and surprisingly soft black substance on top of a gray round and very small plateau. It was like that before, and it was happy. And then suddenly there is a bright light, and everything disappears, to be replaced by a barren and cold, cold, cold ground, that is really really rough on his little grub legs, and a huge black ceiling and then suddenly everything went hot, and he thought that he would die from the heat, so it closes its eyes and prays, despite not knowing how to, or what prayer actually is, or to whom the prayer is for. It just closes its eyes and hopes with all of its tiny little body that it will survive.

And then it came to this, except that everything hurts, although its small grub brain can barely comprehend pain. Instead, everything feels dull and kind of throbbing, and the world swims through its eyes. Also, in the distance, there is a sort of large white thing that shuffles sideways towards it, and it is scared, so it tries to move all of its legs, but it scrabbles futilely on the rough, unfamiliar ground. Frantic, it twists and turns, and flails around in general, before a pincer hand picks it up and carries it somewhere.

* * *

A little grub opens his eyes. As of yet, he is less than a sweep old. Its destiny is determined, but not known.

He opens his eyes because he hopes that the bubbly cold hell is over. It isn't.

He doesn't know why he's stuck in a tub full of little round things that floats and flies and pops as soon as he tries to eat it. Not that he'll ever eat another one of those round things again. They taste bitter, although he doesn't understand what bitter means just yet.

He also hates the sensation on his back. It is sharp and rough and tickles just a little bit, but worst of all, it can't make it stop. It tries yelling, but doing that would mean eating more round things. And that would be terrible. It is a battle between evil and a different kind of evil, as far as the grub is concerned. The sounds are also horrible – the continual, almost rhythmic submerging of its young hearing canals into the water over and over again means that all it can hear is a muted sloshing noise inside its head. It shakes his head, but only succeeds in making everything wet.

And then suddenly everything stops, to be replaced by a sort of warmth. Everything turns white. He is wrapped in a towel, and pincer-like hands gently rubs him until he feels nice and warm, and sleepy and tired. He closes his eyes. All is well.

* * *

A little grub opens his eyes. He promptly shuts it again. All that he sees is green.

He is in his cocoon, and he feels a tranquil peace, knowing that nothing in the world could disturb this barrier. He doesn't know that he will change into something completely different when he grows up. He doesn't know that he will become strong, and proud, and large. He does know that the gooey green stuff that he eats as a method of sustenance tastes good, though. He feels like he's changing…

Well, not like he knows what changing feels like. He's still just a grub after all.

The changing grub goes back to sleep, unconsciously opening his mouth once or twice to gulp down food.

* * *

A young troll opens his eyes, and rises with a small squelch as some of the slime is dislodged from his recuparacoon.

It is just another fucking day in his fucking life. Let's think about what he's fucking got to do, shall we? That bastard Gamzee and Tavros randomly sends their fucking stupid raps battles at him, and with his luck he'd get the same fucking ones twice because the other didn't know the other already sent that exact copy to him. He'd have to read their fucking quirks and tell them what he thinks of it. It just occurred to him that he can just say fuck you and your stupid rap, but he couldn't fucking bring himself to do it. They're like fucking little children. They didn't think that it's wrong.

Vriska and her doofus cohorts wants him to play FLARP and risk his bloody neck. Well that ain't going to fucking happen. Mainly because he lives half a continent away, and that fucking Crablouse wouldn't let him walk more than fifteen troll miles away from his house.

Something rings on his desk. It's his Trolltop.

Well look who just fucking decided to bother him on this fucking imperfect day. Sollux. Probably going to boast on some more of his fucking haxxorz skills, that fucking showoff. Hacking doesn't even work that way. Hacking isn't supposed to work that way. It's supposed to be a bunch of talking to people and a lot of password guessing. How the fuck does he do it. He threw a glob of slime at his laptop to shut it up and sinks back into his recuparacoon.

And he just remembered: today is fucking chore day. Crablouse is gonna have him wash clean every fucking floor of his house. Fuck his chores. Fuck his lusus. Fuck him. Fuck his life.

The young troll sighs. Fucking assholes, he thought. But then again, he thought that every day.

He tries to go to sleep. He really did.

And then there's a knock on his door. Fucking lusus, he thought.

He ignored it and went back to sleep.

* * *

A teen- aged troll opens his eyes.

It is his sixth sweep at last. He will receive his name.

With growing expectation, he counts the seconds down. Why do they have to move so fucking slowly… come on… come on…

A small grey window popped up above his head. Fuck yeah!

Now to see what his name would be – oh, you've got to fucking be…

BULGEREEK NOOKSTAIN, the box reads.

Bulgereek Nookstain.

In a fit of rage, which is his default state, but this time with a deeper kind of rage, he took his sickle from his nightstand and slashes the sign vertically in half.

No bullshit, he thought. I am sick and tired of this – oh, this is better…

KARKAT VANTAS, the box reads.

Now there's a better name.

Karkat Vantas.

And internally, he smiles. It's going to be a fucking amazing life.

* * *

Karkat Vantas opens his eyes.

It appears to be his birthday again. How fucking meaningful.

He rises up from the soft hell that is his pillow. How humans sleep on a bed, he'll never understand, or know. Don't they have a desire for soft, warm goo? At least he knows that humans and trolls share one common trait: they often sleep naked. Although humans do it for some weird reasons, and sometimes together. He never really understood that part.

The doors of the laboratory, now his bedroom, slides away to reveal an empty hallway, which is dark and unlit, and most of all, empty. The corridor yawns to both sides and seems to fall into darkness. The only illuminating light is the dim one coming from his room, which only designates a dark shade from a darker one. To trolls, however, the darkness is blinding. To humans also, he presumes, but for entirely different reasons.

He steps on the teleporter and appearified into the living room area, which is the computer room. Usually, his frien- his enemies, since the troll for enemy is the same as friend, hangs around here. Except that they don't right now.

The computer room is littered with the usual pile of horns and bits of robotic things and dried blood. He breathes in and takes in the smell. He's lucky. It's only repulsive today.

He can also smell the other trolls in their various hiding places.

Well, it's his birthday, he guesses…

"OH MY, LOOK AT THE STATE OF THIS ROOM, I FUCKING WONDER WHERE MY ENEMIES HAVE GONE. I CAN'T HELP BUT NOTICE HOW SUSPICIOUSLY EMPTY THIS ROOM IS. PANIC PANIC FUCKING HELP ME."

He didn't have to wait long.

A green blur crashes into him from beneath the horn piles, while the tiles explode from beneath him in a burst of purple and red and blue. The far wall shatters, the debris missing him by the slightest inch, and two figures, one clad in steel and nuts and various bolts, steps out. From beneath a table crawls out a sheepish monarch, while from the ceiling drops two trolls, one of which lands with his spear on the ground to slow his descent somewhat. The other luckily drops on both the spear and the troll. From behind him, a familiar honking sound emanates, followed by the tap tap tap of a walking stick, and a circular section of the ceiling is cut away with a loud buzz.

And all of them spoke, in their various but cherished inflections and tones,

"HAPPY WRIGGLING - E DAY!"  
"Happy wwriggling day, I guess…"  
"Happy Wriggling Day"  
"D- Happy wriggling day, lowblood "  
"Happy wriggling day kk"  
":3 Happy wriggling day, my mate- I mean moirail!"  
"HaPpY WrIgGlInG dAy MoThErFuCkErS"  
"uH, hAPPY wRIGGLING, dAY i gUESS,,"  
"Happy wriggling day! ;:::)"  
"happy wriggling day 0u0"  
"H4PPY WR1GGL1NG D4Y K4RKL3S"

Struggling under the weight of his friends, he suffocates.

And he smiles, too. He wouldn't have his birthday any other way.

* * *

Karkat wakes up from the suffocation, and found out that it was only his blanket, which somehow crept over his nose and his mouth.

And then he cries.

Because right now, he is speeding as fast as the speed of light to an unknown place, stuck in a meteor with two humans and two other trolls, and all of his friends are dead.

He glances at the clock. It reads 12:00 PM.

A second later, it is his birthday again.

* * *

Whew. That's that then.

Hope you enjoyed it. And I'm aware I may have gotten some of the quirk wrong, and more than likely I'll have some of my grammar wrong, too. If that's the case, please tell me via the helpful review button ;)

Even if there isn't, press the button anyways. It's helpful. XD

Oh, and have a happy 612!


End file.
